Approval has been granted for an overgrown patch of the New Town to be coverted into community allotments. A row of Georgian tenements on MacKenzie Place, near Stockbridge, was demolished in 1967. The only remnants of the buildings, located below Doune Terrace and beside the Water of Leith, are a line of bricked-up cellars. In recent years, the area has been relatively untended, with crumbling walls and fallen trees.
Edinburgh World Heritage has provided a grant of £41,000 and Edinburgh City Council funding of £50,000 to turn the land into community allotments and gardens. The allotment project is expected to be finished later this year.
Adam Wilkinson, Director of Edinburgh World Heritage said: "A touch of lateral thinking means that rather than building a mass of allotment sheds, we're able to use a relatively small grant to bring these redundant cellars back into use after 40 years as an altogether more elegant form of storage. We're delighted to be able to support the community of the World Heritage Site in this way, and reduce the distance people have to travel to allotments, while tidying up a previously unloved space."
Work has already started on clearing the site of undergrowth and investigating the soil conditions. Sections of a retaining wall will also be restored, and the cellars opened up and repaired with new doors fitted.
Councillor Robert Aldridge, Environmental Leader, said both locals and residents on allotment waiting lists will benefit from the new ground. The Council recently announced a strategy for addressing the upsurge of interest in allotment gardening - there were over 2000 on the waiting list in 2010, compared to 400 in 1998.
"This is great news that a disused plot of waste ground is being turned into something useful. Allotments are excellent for contributing to a year-round healthy lifestyle and help to promote sustainability and well-being. People enjoy growing their own vegetables and flowers and these new allotments will benefit the community and be a permanent feature for years to come,” said Aldridge.
While the new allotments are being welcomed by locals, proposals to include a five-metre high, trapezoidal, timber "hut", which would act as a gatehouse to the allotments, met with howls of protest from the local community and the design is being reconsidered.